You know what's funny? They keep saying "sugary soft drinks", but the average glass of juice has as much sugar as any soda on the market.

The idea, I believe, is that you'd be getting more nutritional value with all of that sugar you're ingesting. Of course, that is going to wildly vary based on fruit juices, and it's generally best to eat fruit properly as I recall. It's hard to be worse than what is basically just sugar/corn syrup in carbonated water with only colorings and flavorings to give it an identity.

...Well, I'm a Snapple/Ice Tea kind of guy anyways, but still dumb to impose this kind of restriction. The intention is fairly noble, but I think there's some better means to do so...or magically make people more responsible for their food and drink choices, and face consequences.

I always thought soda would eventually ban this stuff for health reasons. I already treat it the same way I treat alchohol (only 1 glass a day, and only drink it at night). I still don't agree that they should've "banned" it, especially since I doubt this will actually lead to anything good.

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“MY NAME IS POKEY THE PENGUIN I LOVE CHESS!! IT IS LIKE BALLET ONLY WITH MORE EXPLOSIONS!”I Draw Stuff Sometimes

Soda isn't culinary shit, it's just heavily processed now. I've had a fresh lime soda made of freshly carbonated water and lime syrup (lime juice and sugar ) that was actually very tasty. You overprocess something to make it cheap and mainstream, and of course it's not going to be healthy. When was the last time you bought a container of fruit juice that was 100% juice and didn't cost triple the price of an equally sized juice cocktail or juice drink? Here's a good one, how many 100% juice drinks are 100% of the same juice? Juicy Juice was notorious for that. Ideally we should only eat fruit and drink only water. Course, that means you have to buy water now, since only a few places in the world offer decent tap water. A 16 ounce bottle of water, btw, costs as much as a 12 ounce can of soda, or a 23 ounce can of Arizona iced tea (another sugary atrocity that just tastes awesome).

If you'd like to know why so many people drink so much soda, it's because a 2 liter bottle of generally any soda in most super markets only costs a dollar and fifty cents, unless you get a sale where then it's a buck. The equivalent 2 quart (wait sorry, moat orange juice companies changed that, now 59 ounce) container of Orange Juice now costs minimally 3 dollars when on sale, generally 4 or better otherwise. Even if we succumb to lower value juice drinks like ocean spray juice cocktails (30% juice, 40 grams of sugar per serving roughly) or tropicana fruit punches (15% juice and about the same sugar content) we still see prices twice as high as the equivalent 2 liter bittle of soda. Guess what ladies of gentlemen, healthy=expensive. Not everyone is a multimillionaire like michael bloomberg, most of us actually work to get paid (check bloomberg's yearly salary as mayor, guarantee you'll be shocked). If I had a 6figure salary I'd probably be drinking only 100% fruit juice as well, but til I hit the mother lode and make some serious cash, soda is cheaper, and diet soda is sugar free anyway.

But anyways, you're right about most of that. The "drink runs" that my family does, which means we go to the grocery store twice, once to buy food and the second time to get juice water and some soda, usually runs us about $100 right there, and the soda is usually the cheapest of the bunch. I still remember 10 years ago when $150 was about how much we paid for the whole family, back when soda and kool-aid was all we ever drank, which I'm sure only amounted for a small portion of the cost. Yes, I know inflation and gas prices have attributed to that as well, but still, like D said, healthy stuff is usually far from the cheapest option, and people gotta pay the bills, you know?

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“MY NAME IS POKEY THE PENGUIN I LOVE CHESS!! IT IS LIKE BALLET ONLY WITH MORE EXPLOSIONS!”I Draw Stuff Sometimes

You know what's funny? They keep saying "sugary soft drinks", but the average glass of juice has as much sugar as any soda on the market.

The idea, I believe, is that you'd be getting more nutritional value with all of that sugar you're ingesting. Of course, that is going to wildly vary based on fruit juices, and it's generally best to eat fruit properly as I recall. It's hard to be worse than what is basically just sugar/corn syrup in carbonated water with only colorings and flavorings to give it an identity.

Yep. The difference between juice and soda is that whereas juice is nutrients and some combination of sugars (which the body needs anyway in the form of glucose - also why it's recommended to eat lots of fruit), soda is basically liquid syrup. Think of it as the difference between grilled chicken made at home and KFC.

From a purely economic standpoint, it make sense to encourage healthy eating habits to control health insurance and medical costs, which is the only reason I care about anyone I don't know not becoming obese. That being said, I really have no clue whether or not this will work. And since I live in NJ, I don't care!

I don't drink soda. I had to stop awhile back due to health issues. carbonation doesn't jive with stomach problems. What do I drink nowadays? Water and iced tea. Neither of which costs much at all. I never buy bottled water. That's a crazy racket. We have a whole house water filter so I have no problem drinking it. We also make iced tea all the time, which doesn't cost much. Whenever I go out I almost always get tea. There are ways of eating and drinking better without going broke. We are hardly rich, but have learned to eat much better than we used to. It DOES cost a bit to buy fresh fruit and veg a couple times a week, but it's worth it.